


To No Regrets

by celticvampriss



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: AU, F/M, Vampire AU, rivetra
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-29
Updated: 2015-05-29
Packaged: 2018-04-01 19:53:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4032553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celticvampriss/pseuds/celticvampriss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Petra is celebrating her engagement.  Levi crashes the party.  He could not have stayed away and, secretly, she did not want him to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To No Regrets

**Author's Note:**

> This is a vampire AU. Vampire!Levi. Heavily inspired by the NBC’s Dracula. Though it’s not a direct AU of that show, I had it in the back of my head while I wrote this. Petra is an aspiring doctor/med student. London/Historical AU.

“Oh God.”  Petra Ral hissed into her glass.  Champagne bubbles tickled her lips as she drank, then she tipped her head back so the whole of it went down her throat and she pulled the glass away with a loud ‘ah.’  She set the empty glass down on the tray of a passing server and wormed her way through the throng of people.  Of all the inconvenient things to happen at her engagement party…though she had not really expected anything less.  And she was lying to herself if she claimed she hadn’t been secretly hoping…

“Mr. Ackerman.”  She said, coming to a stop right in front of the newly arrived guest.  He had barely made his introductions and she had the mind to stop him before he could.  To throw him out.  _You’re not welcome.  This is my_ engagement _party.  You are not welcome here.  Not when a look from you makes me question that very promise._

He dipped his head, not bothering with a smile or with any other cordial greeting.  Typical.  He showed up when he knew she would not want him there and then he’d go and act like social conventions were beyond his trouble.

Her eye twitched as she studied him.  She feared a wandering gaze, a too observant eye that might catch her change in pulse or the sweat building in her palms under the opera gloves.  She glanced around as she leaned close to whisper under her breath, “You should not have come here.”

He leaned in, “Then ask me to leave.”

She spoke through her teeth.  “You know that I cannot.  What reason would I give?”

He shook his head, moving to meet her eyes directly when she refused to let them rest on him too long.  His gaze was always so intense, so genuine.  His emotions were so carefully concealed and locked away, never once managing to alter his face, but when Petra looked into his eyes there was never anything but truth in them.  For that, she had always been appreciative.  “No.  I mean, tell me you don’t want me here and I’ll make my own excuses.”

She hesitated, swallowing thickly.  How had it gotten so hot so fast?  She lightly fanned herself with a gloved hand.  “I…”  She pursed her lips.

He waited.  She had no doubt that he would do exactly as he said.  If she gave the word, he would excuse himself and to hell with any gossip or suspicion that came from it.  He had to go and make her like him again.

“Very well.  Stay.  I don’t want to be answering questions about your sudden absence.”  She sighed.  Then she plucked another fizzing champagne glass from a serving tray.  

He was dressed less formally than the occasion called, though still meticulously neat.  His suit was flattering while still not reaching the level of elegance that one expected at such an event.  It drew eyes, but never direct insult to his face, for fear of his recently allied social ties.  Erwin Smith was said to have a ‘great interest’ in Levi Ackerman, much to the curiosity of societies’ elite, since Levi had been less than beneath society, with no know history whatsoever.  But no answers were ever given and Levi neither asserted his backing in Smith nor did he defy it.  He was only ever as sociable or agreeable as he needed to be to keep Smith in good opinion.  It was the single greatest mystery that the elite had delighted in for ages.

Still, Levi’s presence at Petra Ral’s engagement party to Lord Darius Zackly’s son, Tobias—a preening philosophical man in his early 30s set to inherit his father’s lands and titles—was not unexpected in the eyes of the guests.  It was, however, still very irritating.

—o0o—

Levi moved through the crowd, hands in his pockets, his eyes picking out faces and names, but always shifting back to Petra.  Always.

He did not make an appearance at her party to upset her.  Nor to challenge her fiancé as he had very often imagined.  He was here, as always, for her.  Because his jealousy was in control, but not entirely subdued.  This party, at it’s very core, preyed at the murderous monster lurking under the human façade.  It tested his strength of will.  Erwin would flip shit if he knew that Levi had strayed from his direct orders by going.  Yet when he set out into the night this is where his feet had carried him.

For a while he refused offers of refreshment or hors-d’oeuvre, but then the necessity for concealment won out and he took a glass.  He let the liquid rest against his lips until allowing the putrid champagne into his mouth.  He swallowed it down and felt its bubbling weight settle like a fizzing paste in his stomach.

Petra had circled through the room again, coming to his side and meeting his face with a smile.  “What’s wrong?  Do you not care for champagne?”

“Not particularly.”

She shook her head and held out her hand.  “Then pass it over.”

He followed the motion of her arm with his eyes as she brought the glass to her lips.  He felt that tightness in his chest, the heart that wanted to stir for this woman, but couldn’t.  Instead, he looked back at the crowd.  Dancing.  Talking.  Eating.  A fleeting spec of existence and they wasted it pretending to enjoy each other’s company.  It was maddening.

“How’s your study with Dr. Zoe?  The apprenticeship.”  He asked, not that he didn’t already know.  Dr. Zoe was a very close acquaintance of Erwin and Levi had, when he wasn’t ready to throttle the doctor, managed to extract an account of the promising med-student who challenged the notion of female doctors.  Levi knew Petra had wanted to be a doctor since the sudden death of her mother to a sickness some believed might have been treated if her father had been able to afford the right doctors.  Petra was driven by a righteous fury to see that didn’t happen to more mothers.

She turned to him with a genuine light in her eyes, the closest he ever came to sunlight, and he only saw it when she talked about her work.  Or when her guard slipped while they were alone.

“It’s going very well.  I have learned so much first hand, more than I ever had in those classrooms.”  She said.  “I’ve managed to help with real cases, a few were unique enough that I might never have otherwise gained the experience.  The field of medicine can be…so challenging at times.  It never stays still.”  She said the last almost to herself.  Her stare far away.  “The human body can be so diverse and yet we are all comprised of the same basic organs and needs.”

He turned his eyes away from her.

“Levi.” She put her hand to her mouth.  “Sorry, I should not…I mean, Mr. Ackerman—”

“Levi.”  He said.  “I prefer Levi.”

“Oh.”  She smiled.  “It does feel…too intimate, though.  To call you that.  Especially in such a…setting.  We haven’t known each other that long…I, I’m not sure if I would count you as a friend…”  She licked her lips and he sensed that shift in her pulse, heard it, _smelled_ the sudden rush of blood to her cheeks, the flutter of her nerves.  The honeyed brown of her eyes dilated to near black when she looked at him.

It was wrong to want and yet he could hardly stop himself.  Even as the desire mingled with the hunger that he’d neglected in coming here.  He was in control.  He would never let his control slip enough to put her in danger.  He’d tear open every throat in that room without a thought if it meant no harm would come to her.

But they were in the middle of a crowded ballroom.  With prying eyes and intrusive glances.  She snapped to her senses, though _she_ had been the one parting her lips, and it had been entirely her own choice to pinch the elbow of his sleeve to steady herself.  He had made absolutely no move toward her.  The perfection of self-control.  If anything were to happen he would only accept her complete consent to it, anything short and he’d hate himself more than he did.

Petra put a hand to her forehead and stepped free of his personal space.  “I should find my…”

“Miss Ral, there you are.”  A voice carried over the crowd.  Some Politician’s wife, Levi could never keep track, and no doubt a guest of the future groom and not the modestly unspoiled Miss Ral.  She was older and chatty and Levi hated her immediately.  “There is such a great lack of dancing.  It puts one in the mind of morose times, not a celebration of such an advantageous union.”  Levi bristled at the off-handed insult.  Petra was the one marrying beneath her, not the other way around.  

The woman carried on as if her words were merely just that.  “I have already persuaded your charming fiancé to partake of the single ladies.  Why don’t you grab Mr…”  The woman’s eyes took in Levi and the waver in her smile was almost concealed, but the unease that she felt was more a result of human instinct than she realized.  “…Mr. Ackerman and take to the dance floor?“

Petra began to shake her head.  “I’m not certain Mr. Ackerman would…”

Levi offered her his arm.

“Wait.  You dance?”  Petra laughed, the frivolous woman forgotten.

“If I know the steps, yes.  It’s not difficult.”

He saw her restrain from rolling her eyes.  “That’s arrogance.  And it’s very unbecoming.”  She said, taking his arm roughly and only just letting him lead her to the dance floor.  Petra was not one to be lead anywhere if she could help it.  But he would gladly follow.

“It’s not arrogance if it’s correct.”  He said, taking his place in front of her.  They bowed as the music started.

—o0o—

“That sounds an awful lot like arrogance to me.”  She said, stepping with him as his hand rested on her waist.  He moved with such ease, like he didn’t need to breathe to get from one step to the next.  She was determined to match him, which quicken their pace and turned what should have been a casual dance into a competition.  And, all the while, she couldn’t hide the spark of attraction that laced every move so that each step was more intimate, more electric, just _more_ than what it ought to be.

“You’re right.  You’re not bad at this.”  She said, a bit out of breath herself.

He spoke with clarity, instead of between pulls for air.  “Like I said.  I was just being correct.”  

Petra was pulled suddenly flush to him and her chest heaved against the low neckline of her dress.  The corset that constricted her ribcage seemed impossibly tight.  She was so hot.  So flushed.  So energized and yet his skin was still cool to the touch.  His fingers were firm and steady, like everything about him.  He was still and straight and never moved unless it had purpose.  Even to fidget or blink or scratch his face, it was always so deliberate she might have thought he was simply going through the motions.

Faster and faster, they neglected the tempo of the song completely.  The room faded into nothing.  She was gliding through the steps.  She was a slip of wind over the marble floors or she was physically seared to him, fully, in every place she could reasonably manage.

When the music stopped, she did not hear it.  She felt the shift in atmosphere, the subtle murmur of voices now that the song was not drowning it out.  Her body was a hive of pins and needles, she could feel everything.

They pulled apart and Petra had to force her eyes away.  She smiled, fixing the escaped tendrils of her hair and trying to melt into the background.  She saw Tobias coming toward her, a question in his brow, and she quickly said that she did not feel so well and would like to retire.

It was late enough into the evening to not be rude.  

“You do look flushed, my love.”  He said with an air of concern and when he stuck his hand out to rest on her cheek, she brushed it away.

“I just need some air.  And rest.”  She used all her strength to keep her eyes off of Levi.  She could not look at him now, not when she knew she would not be able to keep the emotion off her face.  “I’ll be alright.”

She kissed Tobias on the cheek and felt nothing. 

It was not surprising.  Their marriage was mostly convenience.  Advantageous, as Lady Balto had rightly stated.  She had loved him once, or loved the idea of him, but his offer of marriage had been completely disorienting at the time.  She had been fully intent on saying no except that her father had seemed so genuinely thrilled and misled to believing her affections were greater than they were.  Her father, bless him, had thought it a love match that would also give their family the necessary rise in station that would ensure her stability and happiness in the future.  How could she say no?  Especially when she had held no real plans to marry at all.  Why not someone she was fond of and who would provide her with security that could help her father live a long, unworried life.  In the end, she had almost fancied herself truly in love with Tobias Zackly.

Until she met Levi.

Then all her emotions had come apart in a growing spiral.  He’d chipped away at her lies, brought about this irrational attraction.  He had challenged her while still seeming completely in awe of her.  He made her angry, so callous and very blatantly rude or honest at the worst of times, and yet she had found it engaging in a way conversations with Tobias never were.  He cared about her passion for medicine.  He had encouraged her to take the apprentice position that had led to so much discovery and, lately, her one place of true happiness.

And now he was breaking every single shred of sense she had managed to hold onto.

As Petra made her way to the stairs, he had been there, like a ghost appearing with no discernible arrival, and had offered her a single question.  One that made her heart constrict with dread, while also melting her and causing a thrill that made her knees shake.

She met his eyes, knowing that whatever answer she gave, he would respect it.  She had never once been in fear of that.  Yet, even as the word slipped from her lips she could hardly believe it to be her own voice.

“Yes.”

—o0o—

Levi guided her to the first step and reluctantly let her go.  As soon as she was out of sight he headed for the exit.  He could maneuver easily through the crowd, not stopping to answer insipid questions or acknowledge that his coming and going should honestly matter at all.  Especially given what they all really thought of the apparent nobody who had won the favor of the right person.

Once outside, the cool night air hit his skin and he could sense the presence of horses waiting with carriages.  The footmen and grooms waiting with their charges.  He could count nearly twelve different heartbeats just outside the house.  And a slight hunger burned in his throat, the lingering effects of that champagne leaving a bad taste in his mouth.  He licked at his teeth, hoping that he could calm himself in the next few minutes.  Because there was no way he was stopping now.

He slipped into the shadowed alley beside the house, before it met the next row of houses.  The entire ground floor was lit by the party, but the windows upstairs were dark.  Save one.

He was quick, climbing up the side of the house in complete silence.  He found the window and pushed it open.  Inside he could smell her everywhere.  She was in the curtains, the carpet, the sheets and pillows and plush comforter of the poster bed.  He smelled something else, the faintest musk that nearly ignited the dead blood in his veins.

She had already stripped off her skirts and unpinned her hair.  She looked at him with the faintest hint of sadness.  And if his heart worked, it would have stopped at the idea of causing her distress.

“I knew.”  She said, walking closer.  “I knew from the moment I met you.”

He heard the race of her heart and he struggled with a different kind of control.

She let more layers of her dress fall away.  “I knew I wouldn’t be able to stop.”  She met him by the window, reaching out to him, brushing fingertips along his cheeks.  She paused, a quizzical squint, and he waited without breathing for what she might do.  Then she pressed forward and dragged her fingers up and around his shoulders.

“Was it the same for you?”  She asked, letting her nose rub against his, her breaths puff against his lips.  “Was it?”

He closed his eyes.  Her hands pulled at his cravat, at the edges of his coat, she was persistent and yet her naivety showed as she struggled with the workings of a man’s clothes.  He let out a shallow breath through his nose.  “Yes.”

When she kissed him she pulled him fully into her.  She pulled at his collar and pushed against the back of his head and let her mouth wander and suck, draw wet hard pulls from him until his lip was between her teeth.  He was holding back, resisting every urge so that he didn’t overwhelm her, but she could feel the low moans rumbling up his throat.  She pried open his mouth and dragged her tongue along his teeth.  The noises she was making were unmasked and eager, like she didn’t care to be quiet despite where they were, despite the party under their feet.  

“You’re holding back.”  She was panting, speaking between breaths.  “Don’t.”

“Petra.”  He warned.

She ran her nails down his chest, still clothed in his dress shirt.  “I will tell you if I need you to stop.”

He set his forehead against hers.  With their respective heights, she could look directly into his eyes.

“Please.”  She shook her head.  “In all my life, I have never wanted anything to be mine, with no thought about the consequences.  If I am going to be selfish, please…make it worth it.”

He stilled her hands for a moment, holding them lightly in his, thumb rubbing against the pulse of her wrist.  “If it gets too much—“

“I will let you know.  I promise.”

He swallowed his reserve and kissed her lightly, almost too gently after what the way she had been kissing him seconds ago.  Then he was hauling her up into his arms and walking her backward.

They fell backward onto the bed and she was brazen with her wandering hands.  Then she started to undo the final remnants of that dress so that all her beautiful skin was left open to him.

Levi could admit his lack of reason.  He knew that he was being less careful than he should.  When he had accepted Erwin’s offer, when he had aligned himself with possibly the most powerful vampire in London, Levi had already lived too much of his life directionless.  He survived, he did what he had to, and he had lost what few people he could count as friends.  And he had lived decades, nearly a century, filled with mistakes.  Filled with regrets.  When he had met Petra he knew.  He knew that of all his regrets, she could never be one of them.


End file.
